


Quiet

by BluesfeedUnsolved



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Logic | Logan Sanders Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-08
Updated: 2020-05-08
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:42:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,401
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24074638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BluesfeedUnsolved/pseuds/BluesfeedUnsolved
Summary: The braincells have to stick together, or, Janus defends Logan.
Relationships: Logic | Logan Sanders & Deceit Sanders
Comments: 42
Kudos: 328
Collections: favs





	Quiet

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place after Putting Others First.
> 
> Spoilers for Putting Others First.
> 
> Warnings:
> 
> Logan is sad (But when is he not?).  
> Logan angst.  
> Everyone's being a jerk.

He didn’t hate them. Really, he didn’t. Did he love them? No. Did he like them? Most of the time. Did he enjoy their company? No, not usually and that was mutual. He wished that there was a lie somewhere in there, some tiny wisp of the truth that everything was great, that everything was fine, that he was loved, that he was happy, that he felt love unto others and thus unto him as well. But he didn’t believe in lying to himself. Dreams and fantasies were for other sides, less rational and far less logical ones than he. Logan wasn’t going to kid himself. 

He thought all of these and more as he held his head down with avoided eye contact to pointed fingers and raised voices.

“There’s no way around it, L. You can’t logic your way out of this one,” said Virgil.

“But if you just listened to me even once, I could explain how we can satisfy every party," said Logan.

“Logan, this is kind of your fault,” Virgil said sharply. He didn't mean to raise his voice but if he had to hear one more “you never listen to me,” he was going to lose it.

“You have to be kidding me,” Logan said. “How could this possibly be my fault?”

“You're the one with the schedule. Who else could it have been,” said Roman. He made some sort of dramatic gesture to punctuate his sentences like he usually did. Logan never paid much attention to them.

“Really? I told you all that we shouldn't have gone. I specifically said, and I quote, ‘we have too much that needs to be done by Tuesday and it would not be wise for us to lessen the timeframe even more.’”

Slowly they began to move closer to each other, pointing, growing louder, making dramatic gestures.

“Kiddos, maybe we should calm down a bit,” Patton tried. “Logan, you made a mistake. It's okay. It happens.”

“But, I didn't make a mistake. None of you listened to me. You never listen to me,” Logan said. His voice scraped against them. They had rarely seen him like this, showing the tiniest bits of emotion. He was such a tease sometimes.

“Then we'll hear you out here,” Patton said, trying not to have everyone rip each other apart. “Just tell us how you feel.”

“Feel,” Logan scoffed. “As if I-fine. I try every single day to create a schedule for us, to make sure that we're on track, to keep us functional. Then you all decide to change it or disregard it and go about whatever you want without telling me about it.”

“Okay, so we'll talk to you before we try to do what we think works,” Virgil piped up rolling his eyes. “Logan, I really don't think that this is as big of deal as you're making it out to be.”

“You all never listen to me. I come up with solutions that work, with solutions that are the most logical, with ways for Thomas to be better, and you completely ignore them and myself. It's as if I don't exist.” Logan pointed his eyes at each one of them as he said this.

“When have we never not listened to you? You easily have the most influence out of all of us. Without you, Thomas couldn't do anything.”

Logan just stared at them. He wasn't completely surprised by their responses, but it hit him harder to hear them outloud than in his head.

“Well?”

They were waiting for him to say something. Anything.

“Well, would you prefer me to list all of the time that you refused to listen to me in chronological order or alphabetical by subject matter?”

Virgil sighed and held his hand to his forehead as if to say, “I can't believe that I'm the one with the brain cells right now.”

“Listen, we've all gotten frustrated when Thomas doesn't go along with what we think is right, but don't you think that you're stepping a bit out of line?”

Logan's hands were shaking like he was trying to take flight. He looked directly into the eyes of the other sides, trying to find something to hold onto. Patton's eyes pleaded with him to stop fighting with everyone. In Roman's eyes, he found something he couldn't quite name. He wanted to say that it was a sense of disbelief, but his better judgement placed it as an eye roll, just one more attempt to prove that he was better. Virgil was once again telling him to quit while he was ahead, that he had been there and if he could learn to ease up on everyone else, then they could get along better. Janus wasn’t looking at him but at everyone else.

“Thomas not deciding to go with my ideas is one thing. This is different and far worse, if I say so myself, but perhaps you wouldn't like me to do that,” said Logan sharply. “Maybe I shouldn't even speak. Would that be better for you? Would that make it easier to deal with me?”

“You're rambling, Cicero. Do you have a point,” Roman whined.

He wanted to say that it was like a surge or a bolt of lightning hitting him. It wasn't. That would require far more energy than he had with him. Still, the cut of a sharp word could hurt just as much as a strike.

“I'm just here for exposition, is that it? Quiet, knowledgeable Logan who only speaks when spoken to because he could never contribute something worthwhile. I know that that's the ideal. Every word from my mouth gets ignored is one piece to your figurative and very literal puzzle. There's no point in you denying it. I'm Logic, you can't play dumb or feign ignorance with me. Is this really how you feel? That I add nothing? That I should say nothing? That I am nothing?”

His cheeks felt warm and wet. Touching them didn't help. It didn't stop them from shouting at him or tilting the scale a bit further. It wouldn't cease each piece of their nonsensical, demeaning puzzle from moving a bit further from the ridges of each other. He preached about life and its beauty, about how the chances for you to happen were so slim. He wished that the universe could see what it did and the terrible decision to take a chance on him. Touching it just made his fingers glisten.

Now, what strange experience was this?

“How do you think it feels to know everything? My thoughts never stop and the most consistent one is that I can give as much evidence or advice as I want and it will never matter because you will never listen to me. They say that there is strength in numbers, is that why you all have turned away from me? I have spent far too long exerting my own energy and giving extra thoughts to the ones that constantly permeate my mind for what I did wrong. Well, that is going to cease.

“I know that none of you like me or want me here. Aren't you all about peace and love? How come no one is fighting back? Do I finally have your attention?”

He sank out but not before muttering, “Grow up and get serious.”

No one spoke. Logan would have told them that rumination was key. The brain needs time to process things. But the brain was gone and the emotions that he left behind could only take you so far. 

“Goddammit, Logan. You had to fucking duck out because of a stupid argument,” Virgil said at no one. 

“How are we going to explain this? Logan ducking out could be bad."

"Maybe we should take it in stride. See what happens without the nerd for a few days."

“Logan can’t duck out,” Janus said. They had forgotten that he was there, just watching. “And I’m sorry,-actually I’m not-but what the fuck was all of that?”

He liked to keep himself quiet and he found that it was usually preferred too. Patton was warming up to him, but was still used to having all of the control. Virgil refused to acknowledge him. Roman wanted him to slither back to wherever his brother was.

“What?”

“Logan can’t duck out. He’s said before that he is ‘physically incapable of ducking out.’ How did none of you remember him saying that? He gave a lengthy and logical explanation.”

“You can actually remember every single thing that he says,” Virgil said, mouth gaping open.

“You’ve seen him in action. His verbosity is really overwhelming. It’s always ‘I know more than you. Here are a gazillion facts about people that you have never heard of and don’t care about,” Roman said while making a “blah blah blah” motion.

“Logan gets,” Patton started and paused trying to search for the right word, “excited sometimes and he starts saying a lot of things really quickly and we just can’t handle it. He’s hard to keep up with and understand sometimes, that’s all.”

“Does this kind of thing happen often,” asked Janus.

“Logan ducking out? No. Logan not being able to shut up and then whining about not being listened to? Yes,” said Virgil.

“First of all, I’ll remind you that he can’t duck out, even if he wanted to. Secondly, so, when Logan brings up important points or tries to state his opinion, you immediately shut him down?”

“Well…”

“I mean…”

"Er…"

Janus snorted. Typical.

“Do you even care about him?”

No one looked at him. He stared at each of them individually. This silence was different from the one he kept himself in. Their silence was deafening and excruciating. His silence was calm and calculated.

“Of course we do. He’s a kiddo. He’s one of us,” Patton exclaimed.

Aha. Gotcha.

“Is he really? Then why couldn’t he reveal his own name? Then why did he leave this conversation in tears? How come not a single one of you bothered to see if he was okay?”

“You’re not checking on him either.”

“Because I had to wrangle some stray cats first. Now perhaps I should just bring Logan back here and see what he thinks of all of this.”

“No,” they all said in unison.

“If this is how you treat your ‘kiddos’, then I’m not sure that I want to be part of this family and I think Logan may feel similarly. Because when Patton gets impersonated, it's cuddles and coddling. When it's Logan, you barely bat an eye, and are probably glad that it’s someone else (though you’d all rather have anyone over me).”

“That’s not true,” Patton protested. “You’re one of us now. We know your name and everything now.”

“Is that really all it takes? Then how come Logan didn’t get to give out his own name? I know that you still don’t trust me, and that’s one thing, but you not trusting Logan is completely different. No offense-actually, full offense-he could probably solve half of your issues by himself.”

Janus’ raised eyebrow led him around the discussion circle to the meek sides in front of him. Nothing. No one was saying anything.

“Have fun here with whatever you want to call this because I’m not quite so sure that ‘family’ is cutting it,” he laughed and then sank out.

\---

He may not have ducked out, but that was no reason to act like nothing had happened. The nerve of them to act as though nothing was wrong. Really, he knew that they were just treading water and trying to cover their own asses.

The mindscape was one long hallway that got progressively darker as you continued through it. Normally, one could just pop into any room that they wanted to. Logan liked his privacy and he hated surprises. Each side had their own way of knocking on his door. Roman’s was a grand, over complicated knocking pattern. Remus’ started off small but ended up sounding as though he had twelve hands and not two. Virgil’s was two simple and light knocks. Logan liked this one. Patton’s something cutesy, like you would hear for a doorbell and sometimes the knocks were actual doorbells. Logan did not like this one. 

The last time that Janus has knocked on Logan’s door was to inquire about impersonating him. It could have gone better. Logan’s dark blue door was much more daunting with the impossibility of knowing what he was doing behind it. He gave one singular knock, so soft that if it wasn’t Logan behind that door, they would never have heard it.

“May I come in,” he called.

There was a pause and something that sounded like dirt or crumbs getting swept up.

“No,” Logan firmly from behind his door.

“I’m sorry for impersonating you,” Janus said.

“First of all, no you’re not. And secondly, it’s fine,” he said from behind his door. “I don’t care. They listen to you. They trust you. They accept you. Go to them and leave me alone.”

“Well, clearly you’re not fine. You were doing this newfangled thing with the tears streaming down your red face.”

“I know what crying is,” Logan snapped.

“I didn’t mean it like that.”

“I’m sure you didn’t.”

The problem with Logan sometimes is that he could have almost no inflection in his voice. It was the opposite of Janus, really. Logan could be a very good liar. When he wanted to.

“Do you mind if I sit outside of your door? I won’t come in. You can trust me on that,” Janus said.

“I suppose that I can’t stop you,” Logan said. The energy had been seeped out of him. “I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t want to talk to anyone. I’ve noticed that things only get messed up when I speak. You, yourself witnessed it once again just before.”

“So, we don’t have to talk. We’ll sit with your door in between us, just listening to the quiet,” Janus said.

The quiet things were silence. The other sides were nowhere to be seen. One would expect Remus’ and Roman’s room to be filled to the brim with noises and sounds and screams, but a clever Logan figured out how to make it sound proof and no one thanked him. Janus rested his head against the door. He heard Logan pacing, Logan taking forced deep breaths, paper rustling, and tiny whispers. Logan could only keep a little bubble to breathe and then it must be popped before he got too comfortable. He wasn’t allowed to be comfortable or happy, it seemed.

“I--I broke something,” Logan said in the tiniest whisper.

“Are you hurt,” Janus said in a matching tone.

“No. But would it even matter if I was?”

“Of course it would matter,” Janus exclaimed.

“You’re not logic. I’d like to see you give me one convincing and logical argument.”

Alright, Logan. If this is how you want to do things, then two can play at this game.

He cleared his throat.

“First, I would like to address the item becoming broken. How did it break?”

“Something that I was experiencing-not emotions, do not say that they were emotions-got the better of me. It was the first thing I saw after I had ceased crying. I swiped it off of the table.”

“And what was this item, per say?”

“Nothing important,” he said. Janus could feel Logan curling in on himself.

“If it wasn’t important, then why can’t you tell me?”

“Fine. They gave me a puzzle. I believe that it was supposed to be a metaphor,” Logan said with a bitterness marking each word. “I hate that puzzle and that feeling only grows everytime I look at it. It’s demeaning. I don’t need a song and some ridiculous metaphor about our feelings. All that I want is peace of mind and for someone to be on the other side of my door.”

Logan and Janus were never enemies. They respected each other’s intelligence and ability to use evidence to back up their points, even if they didn’t agree with each other or with their methods. But what they did agree on was that the quiet, small things went the longest way. A song could only go so long before it became off-key. A person, a listener, a friend would stay true.

“What are you doing now?”

Logan didn’t answer. They said nothing. They sat with their backs against each side of the door.

“Is it quiet out there?”

“Maddeningly, so.”

“Contrary to popular belief, my room is never quiet. It reflects whatever I’m thinking and it likes to spit it back at me, whether it be through words on my walls, my own thoughts speaking out loud, or in any way that it sees fit. It’s as if it has a mind of its own and it does: my mind.”

“Not the best place for a breakdown, then,” Janus said.

“I am not having a breakdown,” Logan gritted his teeth.

“Then why don’t you come out of your room? The space outside of your room is large for both of us.”

“I don’t deserve it. I don’t matter anymore, if I ever did. I cannot provide suitable advice, or an opinion, or speak without something terrible happening. It’s safer for everyone if I simply duck out. You all have been persistent in your efforts to erase me and replace me with you.”

“Falsehood. You can’t duck out. You said so yourself.”

“I’m just so tired of it all. If they want you, then they can keep you. I have become obsolete.”

Even from just sitting outside of Logan’s room, Janus could hear faint whispers coming from it; whispers that weren’t always in Logan’s voice. He heard Patton, and Roman, and Virgil, and Thomas, and his own. The brain could never stop thinking could it? And if you gave it something to think about, then it would never shut off. Logan never liked to bring others into his room and he spent as little time in there as possible, perhaps it was because, to him, he was always trapped inside of his room.

“Did you actually remember me saying that or did you get lucky and hear it from my room,” Logan’s small voice crept up on him from behind the door.

“I remembered. Contrary to popular belief, I listen to others when they speak. And I could never possibly replace you. We need you and I don’t know why they can’t wrap their minds around that fact. You’re incredibly important and you do your job well.”

They were comfortable in the silence, or the closest thing that Logan could get to it. It was so quiet that you could hear a pin drop or whispers come from behind him or a glasses-clad side crying against a door.

“Please continue to talk. It makes things quieter,” Logan sobbed. “I really do not want to listen to my own head at the moment.”

“As you wish. Though, I can do passages from philosophers in history or Remus stories. The latter tend to be more comical. So, several days ago, Remus asked me to come look at-”

“Wait.”

He heard Logan stand up and some papers rustle. The gold door knob clicked and turned. The door opened to reveal Logan. His hair was disheveled. His eyes were puffy and red. His demeanor was wan and frail, as if a touch would break him. Logan had changed his mind, hadn’t he? Janus’ silvertongue was always going to be a threat. He could never be safe with him around, could he? Nothing would ever get better if he kept him around. This was his destiny, wasn’t it? To be thrown out? First by Thomas, then by the “light sides”, then by Virgil, and now it was Logan’s turn to decide that he wasn’t worth it. After all, what was one more betrayal?

“Would you like to come inside,” Logan asked softly.

Janus and Logan greeted each other with a smile. Logan closed the door behind him. It was something small and something quiet. For the first time, Logan let someone else into his room. He wouldn’t have to wait around and see if someone would sit with him on the other side of his door anymore.

“It would be my pleasure.”


End file.
